So they confirmed that my mom does in fact have cancer, which is sad times, but it's very, very low down in her rectum and the cells are the type that are very sensitive to radiation and it hasn't spread anywhere and has a very very low chance of spreading anywhere. Assuming they don't spread, either she's just going to get radiation until it shrinks and goes away, or she's going to get radiation and then have a surgery to get the rest of it out, but not anything that would have an effect on her life long-term like a colostomy.

So basically, we got just about the best result we could get without them telling us that it wasn't actually cancer. So, no more worrying so much!